The MBA Essay Preparation Process

If you started writing your essays before starting to work with your application consultant, you have 2 options:

  • You can jump immediately to stage 4 described below. If your essays contain strong content – this will be the most efficient and cost effective option.

– or –

  • Start from stage 1, without showing your written essays to your application consultant. You may use parts of them during stage 3. If this option leads to changes in essay content (compared to the original essays you wrote), there is a likely chance that your essays will end up stronger.

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The essay creation process is usually comprised of 4 steps:

An MBA essay outline interview is a structured discussion conducted by an ARINGO consultant to create the skeleton or abstract of your essay. Its purpose is to create a logical flow of content and ensure crucial information isn't missed. The interview uses the original “Admissions Drivers” system to determine relevant content, focusing on the essay's subject (e.g., ‘describe your greatest achievement’). During the interview, your consultant will take notes of your responses in the form of an outline, considering topics emphasized by admission committees based on ARINGO research. The outline, structured from your actual words, aims to be the basis of an authentic essay with optimal effect on the admission committee. If time or budget is limited, or if you possess reasonable writing skills, consider optional tips for streamlining the outline writing process.

Following the outline interview, the ARINGO consultant will write the outline of your MBA essay. In many cases, the outline will include short bullet points or exact quotes of content points that you raised during the outline interview. The consultant will send you the completed outline once it has been written.

To write the first draft of your MBA essay, you should base it on the outline you received. After writing, send it to your consultant through the Client Interface. In applicable cases, the Client Interface also allows you to send the essay to the relevant school analyst, an MBA program graduate who ensures your essays contain specific nuances for your target program. Remember, while the outline provides content anchors, it is crucial to add your personal touch and personality to the essay. Your essays should be moving, personal, honest, and true to evoke empathy within the reader.

The MBA essay editing process involves your consultant first focusing on the content of your essay draft. If strategic or structural changes are required, your consultant will point them out to you. This process is often gradual, typically requiring 2-6 editing rounds to achieve a satisfying version. However, for cost-effectiveness, one or two editing rounds are often sufficient, as the added value of each subsequent round is usually smaller.

Make sure you send your essay drafts to your consultant through the Client Interface. This will ensure that you will receive all the instruction you need during the process.

The process described above was defined in order to fulfill a dual-purpose:

An authentic essay is a personal, honest, original, interesting, and occasionally moving or daring essay. Its purpose is to show that behind the words of the essay there is a human and unique person. An authentic essay evokes interest within the reader. It is memorable, and quite often arouses sympathy towards the applicant.

One of the main purposes of your ARINGO consultant is to assist you in different ways to write authentic essays.

Our conversations with admission committees show that authentic application documents are often more effective in terms of admission chances. Therefore, ARINGO instructs its application consultants to maintain your original language when editing the text. This includes small foreignisms (indicators that English is not the first language of the applicant) to maintain authenticity. In the case of foreignisms, if you feel that this approach should not apply to you, please instruct your application consultant accordingly.

A focused essay has the content and the logic that increase your admission chances. A focused essay doesn’t have to be a literary masterpiece. It has to show that you have the characteristics (“Admission Drivers”) that the specific program your are applying to likes its students to have.

According to our experience, a focused essay is not necessarily a super-impressive essay, however it “gives you points” on the qualities that the Admission Committee is looking for in its MBA candidates.

In order to write effective application essays, take another look at Work Effectively with ARINGO Tips, before starting to work on your essays. Also, it is recommended that you take a look at the article Successfully Negotiating the Essay Maze.

Much luck with the process,
The ARINGO Research Team

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